Weekly Update – Week of September 3rd, 2019

Happy Labor Day Y’all! Even I take vacations. 

Baseball – MLB: Verlander’s 3rd no-hitter. Pederson goes from rocking it to contusion in the same game. Yankees get shut out. Braves manager is back along with Dodgers Urias.

Basketball: USA survives in OT in FIBA World Cup

Football – College: 1 loss in the Top 25. Overall wins/losses. Hurts so good. Week 2 – 2 top 25 match ups.

Football – NFL: Season begins Thursday! Elliott still negotiating in Dallas. Colts sign a QB. Clowney goes from a bull to a bird. Ollison honors bro with a number change.

Golf: New PGA Tour members.

Olympic Sports: Coleman cleared of doping. Van Niekerk’s knee hurts. Biles’ bro arrested. Liu lands quad lutz in competition.

Tennis: US Open Finals are on Saturday (W) and Sunday (M)

Baseball – MLB:

• Astros’ pitcher Justin Verlander had his 3^rd no-hitter of his career on Sunday against the Brewers. Only Nolan Ryan (7) and Sandy Koufax (4) have more no-hitters. Verlander walked the 2^nd batter of the entire game and that was it.
• Dodgers’ RF Joc Pederson suffered an abdominal contusion during the 16-9 win over the Rockies while reaching over the short fence to steal a HR away from Blackmon in the fifth inning. Before that, Pederson had had a great game with a HR in the first inning, hit a baseball off the fence in the 2^nd and another homer in the 3^rd that when 416 feet. He will not miss much time if any due to the injury.
• The Rangers shut out the Yankees 7-0 on Monday. This is the first shut out for the Yankees since June 2018, 221 games. This streak was the 2^nd longest in history after the Babe Ruth Yankees from 1931-33 which stretched 308 games.
• HoF Braves’ manager Bobby Cox made his first appearance back at SunTrust park after suffering a stroke 5 months ago.
• Dodgers Julio Urias is back after serving his 20-game suspension for domestic violence allegations. He will start for the Dodgers against the Rockies tonight. Urias says he’s moving forward.
• Chace Numata, who was in the minor leagues for the Tigers, died on Monday from injuries after a skateboarding accident at the age of 27.
• Here are the standings of each region in the league:
  • American League
    • East: Yankees
    • Central: Twins
    • West: Astros
  • National League
    • East: Braves
    • Central: Cardinals
    • West: Dodgers

Basketball:

• USA edges out Turkey in OT 93-92. Turkey missed 4 consecutive free throws with 9 seconds left. American Khris Middleton made 2 free throws in the last 2.1 seconds of the game. Team USA advances to the 2^nd round which will be played this weekend.

Football – College:

• Week 1 wasn’t too crazy with only 1 loss in the Top 25 coming in the only Top 25 match up. Auburn beat Oregon 27-21 and only led for 9 seconds the whole game. This isn’t the first time Oregon has lost a big lead in recent memory either. This makes the Pac 12 0-10 against ranked SEC teams since 2008.
• Notable wins:
  • Auburn – duh. This ought to move them up the rankings nicely and looks like the Pac 12 is in for another rough year.
  • UNC and Mac Brown won their first test against South Carolina. This is Mac’s first game since coaching the longhorns from 1998-2013.
  • Louisville lost to #9 Notre Dame last night 35-17 but this was a decent score considering they only won 2 games last year. They also had some impressive defensive stands, although the fumbles were a huge problem. 3 fumbles in 3 plays…
  • The American Athletic conference. Memphis beat Ole Miss 15-10 which was a big victory for the conference. Cincinnati beat UCLA 24-14 and Houston put up a good fight against #4 Oklahoma (losing 31-49).
• Not necessarily losses outright but def some losers of the weekend:
  • Tennessee actually lost to Georgia St 38-30
  • #21 Iowa St went into 3OT to get the W against an FCS team in Northern Iowa… they ultimately won but it wasn’t pretty
  • West Virginia fans have a rude awakening after being ranked the last couple of seasons to barely beating James Madison 20-13 this weekend.
  • It wasn’t a strong showing in the Big 12 in general with another team struggling against a bad opponent. Oklahoma St beat Oregon St 52-36. Considering Oregon St only won 2 games over the last 2 seasons, I would not capitalize this w for the win.
• Injuries to report:
  • South Carolina lost their starting QB Jake Bentley to a foot injury that puts him out indefinitely. Freshman Ryan Hilinski will take the job until then.
  • Texas freshman RB Jordan Whittington is the latest Texas RB to be sidelined. He has a sports hernia and will miss 4-6 weeks. 2 other RBs are injured and missed the first game. The Longhorns are hoping their luck improves before they play #6 LSU on Saturday.
  • #3 Georgia’s WR Kearis Jackson broke his hand and will be out for 3-4 weeks. The Bulldogs are hoping he will be back for the match up against #9 Notre Dame on Sept 21^st.
  • USC’s starting QB JT Daniels will miss the entire season after he tore his ACL and meniscus on the field Saturday. He will have surgery and will be able to redshirt. USC will now look to true freshman Kedon Slovis to start.

• Jalen Hurts had a record setting debut for Oklahoma against Houston. Hurts threw for 300 yrds and 3 TDs and ran 150 yrds and 3 scores in the game. The only other player to do that in the last 15 yrs was Johnny Manziel.
• Week 2 brings 2 top 15 match ups! Be sure to tune into these top games of the week.

Week 2
Top Games of the Week
Visitor	Home	Day	Time (CT)	TV
21. Syracuse	Maryland	Sat 9/7	11:00 AM	ESPN
12. Texas A&M	1. Clemson	Sat 9/7	2:30 PM	ABC
6. LSU	9. Texas	Sat 9/7	6:30 PM	ABC
23. Stanford	USC	Sat 9/7	9:30 PM	ESPN
*GameDay indicated in bold*

Football – NFL:

• Season officially starts on Thursday September 5^th with the Packers at the Bears @ 7:20pm on NBC
• Dallas and Ezekiel Elliott have still not reached an agreement on a contract for the year. Owner Jerry Jones is optimistic there will be a deal. Sources have seen Elliott traveling back to Dallas but talks are still being had. This is making plenty of fantasy team owners nervous too as Zeke is usually ~#4 pick in a draft.
• The Cowboys did manage to extend RT La’el Collins’ contract for another 5 yrs. No financial information was provided but it is expected that this will make Collins one of the top 5 highest paid right tackles in the NFL.
• The Colts needed another QB on their roster after Andrew Luck unexpectedly retired last week. They signed Jacoby Brissett for a 2 yr deal for $30MM ($20MM guaranteed).
• Jadeveon Clowney will now be a DE for the Seahawks after a trade for the 3^rd round draft pick, LB Jacob Martin and LB Barkevious Mingo. After 5 seasons with the Texans and a franchise tag on him, Clowney wanted to go to play for Pete Carroll.
• Falcons RB Qadree Ollison changed numbers from 32 to 30 in honor of his late brother who was shot 3xs in 2017 at a gas station parking lot.

Golf:

• 25 players earned their PGA cards on Monday after finishing the Korn Ferry Tour Championship. 25 players got their cards at the end of the regular season (which ended at the Winco Open on 8/18) by being the top 25 money earners for the season. The next 25 come from the winners of the ‘playoffs’ which were the last 3 rounds (Nationwide Championship, Albertsons Open and KF Tour Championship); the top 25 point earners for those 3 tournaments get their cards as well.
  • Here are the newest members to the PGA

Olympic Sports:

• Christian Coleman, the American sprinter, has been cleared of all doping charges, which means he is eligible for world championships later this month and the Olympics next year. He was originally facing a sanction for 3 ‘whereabouts failures’ meaning he did not tell the Anti-Doping agency where they could find him when they came to test. He got cleared because one of the failures technically happened on April 1, 2018 with the final one happening April 26, 2019, more than 1 year apart.
• Sticking with track & field news, Wayde van Niekerk (400m Olympic champion and WR holder) will miss defending his world’s title after a knee injury from a celebrity rugby match in 2017. He says he is planning to be back and fully competitive for the Olympics next year.
• Simone Biles’ brother has been charged with 6 counts of murder, 3 counts of voluntary manslaughter and 5 felonious assaults and 1 perjury charge. Biles and her brother, Trevin Biles-Thomas, did not grow up in the same house. He has been arrested in connection with a NY Eve shooting in Cleveland that left 3 dead.
• Alysa Liu landed a quadruple lutz in the Junior Grand Prix on Saturday to win her debut event. She landed one last week in the Aurora Games but that event was unsanctioned; now it’s official! She is the first American to even land a quad in competition and 6th woman ever. Her performance ended Russia’s streak of winning the Junior Grand Prix every year since 2016.
• Tom Collins who was the entrepreneur behind Champions On Ice died at the age of 88. He was inducted into the figure skating HoF in the US and Canada.
• Russian racewalker Yekaterina Medvedeva has been banned for 8 years for a 2^nd doping offense. She is one of 30 Russian race walkers to be banned.

Tennis:

• US Open continues this week
  • It was not a good day to be #1
    • #1 Djokovic lost to SWI Stanislas Wawrinka in the 4^th round
      • He actually pulled out of the match early after losing the first 2 sets 6-4 and 7-5. His shoulder had been giving him trouble all game but don’t let that take away from Wawrinka’s win which was convincing.
    • #1 Naomi Osaka lost to SWI Belinda Bencic also in the 4^th round
      • This was after Osaka beat American Coco Gauff in straight sets 6-3, 6-0 in round 3. If you need something to restore your faith in humanity, watch this post match interview with the 2 of them!
    • American Serena Williams is still in, winning all her matches in straight sets so far
    • Roger Federer and Nadal are also still in and if they win out, will meet in the final
  • The finals will be played this weekend with the women on Saturday and the men on Sunday

What to Watch This Week

Baseball – MLB:

• Sat 9/7
  • Yankees at Red Sox @ 3:05pm on FS1
    • Happ vs Price
  • Phillies at Mets @ 6:10pm on FS1
    • Smyly vs Stroman
• Sun 9/8
  • Yankees at Red Sox @ 6pm on ESPN
    • Tanaka vs Porcello

Football – NCAA:

Week 2
Top Games of the Week
Visitor	Home	Day	Time (CT)	TV
21. Syracuse	Maryland	Sat 9/7	11:00 AM	ESPN
12. Texas A&M	1. Clemson	Sat 9/7	2:30 PM	ABC
6. LSU	9. Texas	Sat 9/7	6:30 PM	ABC
23. Stanford	USC	Sat 9/7	9:30 PM	ESPN
*GameDay indicated in bold*

• College GameDay will then be in Austin, TX for the Texas/LSU match up.

Football – NFL:

• Thurs 9/5 – Packers at Bears @ 7:20pm on NBC
• Sun 9/8
  • 7 games at 12pm on CBS and Fox depending on your geographical location
    • Titans at Browns
    • Ravens at Dolphins
    • Falcons at Vikings
    • Bills at Jets
    • Redskins at Eagles
    • Rams at Panthers
    • Chiefs at Jaguars
  • Colts at Chargers – or – Bengals at Seahawks @ 3:05pm on CBS
  • Giants at Cowboys – or – Loins at Cardinals @ 3:25pm on Fox
  • Steelers at Patriots @ 7:20pm on NBC
• Mon 9/9
  • Texans at Saints @ 6:10pm on ESPN
  • Broncos at Raiders @ 9:20pm on ESPN

Olympic Sports:

• Thurs 9/5 – Track & Field: IAAF Diamond League: Brussels @ 11pm on NBCSN
• Sat 9/7 – Beach Volleyball: FIVB World Tour Finals @ 11pm on NBCSN
• Sun 9/8
  • Cycling: Vuelta a Espana: Stage 15 @ 1am on NBCSN
  • Track & Field: USA vs Europe Day 1 @ 12pm on NBCSN

Soccer:

• Tues 9/3 – Women’s International Friendly: USA vs Portugal @ 7pm on ESPN2
• Thurs 9/5
  • UEFA Euro Championship Qualifying: Armenia vs Italy @ 11am on ESPNNEWS
  • UEFA Euro Championship Qualifying: Ireland vs Switzerland @ 1:45pm on ESPNNEWS
  • NCAAW: 11. Tennessee at SE Louisiana @ 6pm on SEC
• Fri 9/6
  • UEFA Euro Championship Qualifying: GER vs NED @ 1:45pm on ESPN2
  • Vanderbilt vs Colgate @ 7:30pm on SEC
  • Texas A&M at Ohio St @ 8pm on SEC
• Sun 9/8
  • UEFA Euro Championship Qualifying: SWE vs NOR @ 1:45pm on ESPNNEWS
  • NCAAW: 11. Tennessee at Cincinnati @ 12pm on SEC
  • NCAAW: 9. Vanderbilt at Marshall @ 2:30pm on SEC
  • NCAAW: 16. Texas A&M vs Brown @ 6pm on SEC
  • NCAAW: Mississippi St vs 20. Memphis @ 7pm on SEC

Tennis:

• Tues 9/3 – US Open Quarterfinals
  • Women
    • UKR Svitolina vs GBR Konta @ 11am
    • USA Williams vs CHN Wang @ 6pm
  • Men
    • SWI Wawrinka vs RUS Medvedev @ 1pm
    • SWI Federer vs BUL Dimitrov @ 8pm
• Wed 9/4 – US Open Quarterfinals
  • Women
    • SWI Bencic vs CRO Vekic
    • CAN Andreescu vs BEL Mertens
  • Men
    • ITA Berrettini vs FRA Monfils
    • ARG Schwartzman vs 2. ESP Nadal
• Thurs 9/5 – US Open Women’s Semifinals
• Fri 9/6 – US Open Men’s Semifinals
• Sat 9/7 – US Open Women’s Final
• Sun 9/8 – US Open Men’s Final